Text © World of Showjumping

Richard Vogel (GER) and Cloudio (Casall x San Patrignano Cassini) won Thursday’s CSIO5* 1.60m CANA Cup at the Spruce Meadows ‘Masters’ 2025 in Calgary, Canada.

Seven pairs out of the 56 horse-and-rider combinations at start cleared Leopoldo Palacious’ (VEN) first-round track and joined the jump-off, where Vogel and Cloudio clocked the winning time of 45.54 seconds.

The 2025 European Champion and current world number four took the top honours ahead of his compatriot Jörne Sprehe (GER) aboard Toys (Toulon x Quidam de Revel) in second in 46.31, while Thibault Philippaerts (BEL) and Lyandro (Grand Slam x Ahorn) placed third in 48.54, followed by Max Kühner (AUT) and Count On Me 19 (Cascadello x Cornado NRW) in fourth in 53.19 and Markus Saurugg (AUT) on Obora’s Crunchy Nut (Cardento x Corrado I) in fifth with a fence down in 48.46.

“Cloudio is really an amazing horse, a beautiful addition to our string of horses,” Vogel said after his victory – his second of the week at Spruce Meadows. “He came along very, very well. It is actually his first times that he does those types of shows, we are not in a partnership for so long, but he seems to get better and better. He jumped two Nations Cups already, with a four and clear each, and several five-star Grand Prixs, but he is really still quite green on that level so the CANA Cup today was a tough enough class for him."

"I thought he handled the first round already very impressive; he jumped super and gave me a very good feeling. I saw Jörne going in the jump-off straight away as the first rider pretty fast, so there was not a lot of tactic other than to try to give our best. I have to say he really saved me in the jump-off, I had not the best roll-back to fence number seven and I don’t know how he made it happen, but he cleared the fence and was right with me straight after. So, thanks to him, we are going out of this class as the winners.”

“I think the CANA Cup always is a tough class,” Vogel said about the course. “The time allowed with Leopoldo is always tight, we riders kind of know that and couple of riders also had time faults. It was obviously jumpable but there were a few tricky things. Right away in the beginning fence number two was already the wall and then we had quite short five strides to the plank, where a couple of riders did [with] four strides and did a leave-out, and both of the doubles were something to jump for the horses. I am just very happy with how Cloudio handled all of that. I think it was a very nice class to watch, it was an exciting class, and a super jump-off as well, so I think he designed a very nice course for the CANA Cup today.”

“I am thrilled with Phenyo and Cloudio, about their performances yesterday and today, but also I had United Touch out in the ring for the first time this morning and he jumped very good,” Vogel explained about his week so far as the Spruce Meadows ‘Masters’ 2025 gear towards the two highlights, Saturday’s CSIO5* 1.60m BMO Nations' Cup and Sunday’s 'CPKC International' Grand Prix, presented by Rolex. “We had a couple of time faults, but I was very happy the way he jumped, he feels good. He was a bit too fresh to be critical, but this we can manage and adjust until Sunday, so yeah, hopefully we will have a good shot on Sunday.”